why you need to donate: the economics of curing lymphoma

Blood cancers are the #3 cancer killer in North America. Only cancers of the respiratory and digestive systems, including lung and colon cancers, are more deadly. So why is it underfunded and under-researched?

Because although one million North Americans are living with a blood cancer, it pales in comparison to the 80 million with heart disease, and 30 million with type II diabetes. Because for-profit enterprises see blood cancers as “orphan diseases” with smaller populations and revenue potential, LLS offers expertise and financial encouragement for companies to invest in treatments for blood cancer patients.

Today LLS funds more blood cancer research than any other voluntary health agency in the U.S. or Canada.

LLS is driving innovative research. Even with decades of LLS-supported progress, there are still patients who urgently need more effective and safer treatments. LLS is proactively funding academic research in areas of unmet medical need. With a global research portfolio equivalent to that of a mid-size pharmaceutical company and a 60+ year history of scientific funding, LLS has early intelligence on promising projects. We’re able to identify those we can move at an accelerated pace so that good ideas attract the commercial investment needed to become widely available therapies.

One of the ways that LLS does this is their innovative Therapy Acceleration Program, a strategic initiative to speed the development of blood cancer treatments and supportive diagnostics through investments in: 1. Academia 2. Advanced Biotech research 3. Clinical trials.

TAP looks to fund projects related to therapies that have the potential to change the standard of care for patients with blood cancer, especially in areas of high unmet medical need.

TAP funding assists both clinical investigators and companies in gaining critical proof of concept data that better enables them to obtain the resources they need or a partner to complete the testing, registration and marketing of new treatments for leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma.